🗓️ QUICK FRESHES for Homeschool Families – Week of 31 August 2025 (To Close the Year)

Quick Freshes is our regular Sunday almanac for the homeschool week ahead. Pick one or two (or more!) of the items below each week and use them to enrich your homeschooling schedule. Subscribe to our free homeschool newsletter to get posts like these delivered right to your mailbox each week. Visit our River Houses calendar page to print your own homeschool calendars and planners for the entire year.

🗓 💪 TODAY is the last day of Hercules Term, our summer term in the River Houses, and the last day of the 2024–2025 River Houses year. CYGNUS TERM, our fall term, and the brand new 2025–2026 homeschool year (America 250!), begins TOMORROW, September 1st! 🦢

🌎 OUR YEAR-LONG TOUR of the STATES & COUNTRIES of the world for 2024–2025 is complete! Look at all the wonderful places we have visited over the past year! A brand new States & Countries tour for 2025–2026 will begin next Sunday, September 7th, the first Sunday of the new year, with Delaware 🇺🇸, Afghanistan 🇦🇫, Albania 🇦🇱, Algeria 🇩🇿, and Andorra 🇦🇩.

🌔 THE MOON at the beginning of this week is gibbous and waxing — a good time for moon watching! You can explore the solar system and the features of the moon in your backyard astronomy guide and your homeschool world atlas, and you can learn a host of stellar and lunar facts in the Astronomy section your current world almanac. Browse through our regular homeschool astronomy posts for even more.

🗓 TODAY, Sunday (31 August 2025) — Today is the 243rd day of 2025; there are 122 days remaining in this common year. Learn more about different modern and historical calendars in the Science & Technology section of your recommended world almanac. 📚 Italian educator and physician Maria Montessori was born on this day in 1870. Her approach to early childhood education remains popular in homeschools as well as in public and private schools around the world. 🏫

🏡 The 2025–2026 River Houses Year Begins — Let the river run! 🏡

🦢 Cygnus Term 2025–2026 Begins 🦢

Monday (1 September 2025) — A New River Houses Year Begins! 🗓 Today is the first day of Cygnus Term, our fall term in the River Houses, named for the Great Swan of the Heavens. 🦢 Today is also Labor Day, the U.S. federal holiday honoring the American labor movement, celebrated each year on the first Monday in September. 🛠 And for this first week of September, this first week of Cygnus Term, and this first week of the 2025–2026 River Houses year, our homeschool poem-of-the-week is our traditional adaptation of the Roman poet Horace (65–8 B.C.): “A handsome house to lodge a friend, / A river at my garden’s end.” Print your own River Houses Poetry Calendar and follow along with us throughout the new (poetical!) 2025–2026 homeschool year. 🖋

Tuesday (2 September 2025) — On this day in 1752, nearly two centuries after the countries of Continental Europe, Great Britain and her American colonies adopted the Gregorian Calendar: Wednesday, September 2nd, 1752, was followed by Thursday, September 14th, 1752. Benjamin Franklin famously wrote about the switch in his almanac: “And what an indulgence is here, for those who love their pillow, to lie down in Peace on the second of this month and not perhaps awake till the morning of the fourteenth.” 🗓 Since this is the first Tuesday of the new month and the new homeschool year, today we’ll invite you and your students to begin learning all about your local library by coming along on our twelve-month homeschool tour of the Dewey Decimal system. 📚

Wednesday (3 September 2025) — The American Revolution came to a formal end on this day in 1783, more than eight years after it began, with the signing of the Treaty of Paris between Great Britain and the new United States of America. 🇺🇸 🕊️ 🇬🇧 And next Wednesday we’ll be starting a new Weekly American Heritage tour for the 2025–2026 homeschool year! Print a copy of our American Heritage calendar on the main River Houses calendar page and follow along with us for America’s 250th year! 🇺🇸

Thursday (4 September 2025) — On this day in the year 476, Emperor Romulus Augustulus was deposed by the provincial warlord Odoacer who declared himself King of Italy, bringing to an end the Western Roman Empire, which had lasted for nearly 500 years. 👑 Today is also the birthday of the great Austrian composer Anton Bruckner (1824–1896). 🎵

Friday (5 September 2025) — In response to the Intolerable Acts, the first Continental Congress assembled on this day in 1774 in Philadelphia. 🇺🇸 And on this day in 1836, Sam Houston was elected the first President of the Republic of Texas. 🗳️ Our Friday Bird Families post this week, the first of the 2025–2026 homeschool year, will introduce you to your recommended bird guide. Print your own River Houses Calendar of American Birds and follow the flyways with us throughout the coming year. 🦅

Saturday (6 September 2025) — On this day in 1522, the ship Victoria, the only survivor of the Magellan expedition, arrived back in Spain having completed history’s first circumnavigation of the world. The voyage took just over three years. For a great homeschool overview of the early European voyages of exploration, turn to page 224 in your River Houses history encyclopedia. 🌍 🌎 🌏 🌍 Today is also the birthday of English scientist John Dalton (1766–1844), one of the founders of modern chemistry. ⚗️ And since this is the first Saturday of the month, we’ll post our regular monthly preview today of some of the astronomical events you and your students can watch for over the next few weeks. 🔭

Sunday (7 September 2025) — Today is the birthday of Queen Elizabeth I of England (1533–1603), who gave her name to the Elizabethan Era. For an illustrated homeschool review and timeline of this important historical period, turn to page 260 in your River Houses history encyclopedia. 👑 Today is also the birthday of the much-loved American painter Anna Mary Robertson Moses (1860–1961), better known as Grandma Moses. 🎨 And our Sunday States & Countries for next week, the first group for the 2025–2026 homeschool year, will be Delaware 🇺🇸, Afghanistan 🇦🇫, Albania 🇦🇱, Algeria 🇩🇿, and Andorra 🇦🇩.

🥂 🎉 OUR TOAST for today, the last Sunday of the homeschool year, looks ahead: “To the new homeschool year!”

❡ Toasts can be a wonderful educational tradition for your homeschool lunch or dinner table. We offer one each week — you can take it up, or make up one of your own (“To North American dinosaurs!”), or invite a different person to come up with one for each meal (“To unpredictability in toasting!”). What will you toast in your homeschool this week? 🥂

🌎 🌍 🌏 EVERYTHING FLOWS: Our weekly tour of world rivers will begin next Sunday, September 7th, the first Sunday of the new homeschool year. Why not do a study of world rivers over the course of the coming year! Take the ones we select each week, or start with the river lists in the World Exploration & Geography section of your world almanac, and make it a project to look them all up in your atlas, or in a handy encyclopedia either online or on a weekly visit to your local library. A whole world of geographical learning awaits you.

What do you and your students have planned for your homeschool as the new year begins? 😊

❡ Lively springs: This is one of our regular “Quick Freshes” posts looking at the homeschool week ahead. Add your name to our River Houses mailing list and get these weekly messages delivered right to your mailbox all through the year. 📫

❡ Homeschool calendars: We have a whole collection of free, printable, educational homeschool calendars and planners available on our main River Houses calendar page. They will help you create a light and easy structure for your homeschool year. Give them a try today! 🗓️

❡ Support our work: If you enjoy our educational materials, please support us by starting your regular Amazon shopping from our very own homeschool teaching supplies page. When you click through from our page, any purchase you make earns us a small commission at no extra cost to you. Thank you for helping us to keep going and growing! 🛒